Catalan separatists win majority in polls

BARCELONA: Catalan separatists won a crucial snap poll Thursday, plunging their region into further uncertainty after a failed independence bid rattled Europe and triggered Spain’s worst political crisis in decades.

With turnout at a record high and 99.9% of the ballots counted, the election handed a mandate back to the region’s ousted separatist leaders, even after they campaigned from exile and behind bars.

In a clear indicator of the huge gulf over independence afflicting Catalan society, anti-secessionist centrist party Ciudadanos had the biggest individual result with 37 of the 135 seats in the regional parliament.

But unless the three pro-independence lists fail to clinch a deal to work together, they will rule Catalonia with 70 of the 135 seats in parliament -- two less than their previous tally of 72.

The Spanish government called the election after it took the unprecedented step of stripping Catalonia of its treasured autonomy in the aftermath of an independence declaration on October 27 that rattled a Europe already shaken by Brexit.

At stake was the economy of a region that has seen its tourism sector suffer and more than 3,100 companies -- including the largest banks, utilities and insurers -move their legal headquarters out of Catalonia.